Our Crazy Life

The next 4 months are going to be crazy busy for us, but we keep telling ourselves that in 6 months, it will ALL be over:

Big trip to the island of Rhodes in Greece
11th Wedding Anniversary
My birthday
Pack out of house
Ship car
Phinn's birthday
Enoch's birthday
School year ends
Fly to Seattle - have fun with the High's
Fly to Virginia - see new house for the first time
Hilde's birthday and baptism
Younce family reunion
Move into house
Start kids at new school

Dave's birthday
Somewhere in there go to work, decorate house, buy new furniture, buy new car, etc.

So yes, we are going to be BUSY.

The Deep

We went to the Deep one last time on our way back from Bruges.  The kids love aquariums and Phinn has recently developed a huge fondness for Bish! (fish).  In fact, he had such a great time that when we got home I introduced him to Finding Nemo, surprise, he loved it - at least the 30 minutes that we watched.

 The first real preference Phinn communicated to us was his love for the show In the Night Garden.  At the Deep there was a little ride with one of the characters, IgglePiggle.  Phinn climbed up and gave IgglePiggle a kiss and played next to him for a while, super cute.

How fast time flies.  The first time we went to the Deep was the month after we arrived in England.  Look at how much the kids have grown (and of course the addition of Phinn) since then.

To Bruges or Not to Bruges?

 Our third weekend trip in March was to Bruges, Belgium.  I had planned this months ago, and was really excited to visit the "Venice of the North".  Not everything went smoothly, here are some lessons learned:

1) DO NOT forget that you are in fact going to a foreign country, you do need to pack your passports or you will have to make a side trip on your way out of town....
2) DO NOT buy a Bruges guidebook on the P&O Ferry, no matter how current it says it is
3) DO NOT plan any excursions/meals based on said book, you will waste your day walking to things that are no longer in business
4) DO NOT eat mussels at one of the restaurants on the main square, even if you have been looking for restaurants that don't exist and you are starving, you WILL be sick for the next 36 hours
5) DO NOT walk all the way across town to the kids park BEFORE making the kids go to the toilet, otherwise, you will waste an hour as you backtrack to the public toilets across town.
6) DO go on a sunny weekend, all of our bad luck could not discount the beautiful scenery surrounding us
7) DO take time to go to each and every chocolate shop that calls to you, we ended up running out of time and getting sub-par chocolate at a sub-par store.  Hey, it is still Belgian chocolate, so it isn't bad, just not as awesome as it could have been.
8) DO take a lot of pictures of our cute kids, if they happen to be with you.

Cutie Footie

 I have been waiting seven and a half years, but finally, one of my kids wanted to and LOVED playing football (soccer to you Americans).  He did a session of indoor football and was really sad when it ended after a mere 6 weeks.  And I must say, he went from a kid that had very limited skills, to a pretty decent dribbler and passer.  We both can't wait to sign him up again!

Royal Wedding

And what are you having for your Royal Lunch to celebrate the Royal Wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton?  We got the following note yesterday from Hilde and Enoch's school:

Dear Parents,

School will be celebrating the forthcoming Royal Wedding with a special Royal lunch on Thursday 28th April.  The menu will be as follows:

Chicken a la King
Duchess Potatoes
Princess Peas
Carrot Soldiers

Wedding Cake

I think that if I was doing the menu, I might have added Royal Icing somewhere on the list, how about you?

Aquarium Antics

Our kids love aquariums.  Our last stop on our trip to Wales was to hit an aquarium in Chester on our way back up to home.  They had a great time, but Dave and I were in shock as to how much we paid to see so absolutely little.  And since the day was rainy and cold, the place was completely packed.  What a mess.

 Probably the best part was the Ray tank, where you could pet the rays.  Enoch thought that was pretty cool.  Hilde was much more hesitant, but did eventually pet one or two.

Bedtime

This is going to be the classic picture of Hilde and Phinn together.  Here they are, watching a show before bedtime on Dave's IPad.  Hilde has her new helmet on, and Phinn is 100% devoted to his sister.

These are definitely going to be on display at both of their wedding receptions!